I am, as always, deeply indebted to those ‘hawk-eyes’ from KGS NightWatch who produce a daily ‘intrep’, er, ‘for my eyes only’, of course! Actually, it could be for your eyes, too, if you click on their site and sign up for their reports. Anyway, today they have been summarizing the results of the last eight days of mutual rocketry between Israel and Gaza. It confirmed my gut feeling that not much has changed.
Of course, both sides have learned a great deal about their various weapons systems. The Israelis now know just how effective their ‘Iron Dome’ anti-missile system is, but so does Hamas! Equally, Hamas, and Israel, have learned the capabilities of Hamas's new longer range missiles and their chances of actually bringing down heavy fire onto Tel Aviv. One point that NightWatch do not raise but I do, is the deeply personal knowledge of each and every leader of Hamas that at any time and without warning Israel can send a drone straight through the sunroof of their car or the skylight in their house. That personalizes matters exceedingly and might help to concentrate minds!
According to NightWatch, the massing of 75,000 Israeli troops on the border was always a bluff because the Israelis knew that an invasion of Gaza was a waste of time and effort and Israeli soldiers's lives and would achieve nothing. However, the action that has taken place should assure Netanyahu and his party a good win in the forthcoming elections, an objective not far from their minds, I guess!
Further into the future the outlook for Israel is grim:
So what just happened? After eight days of rocket and air attacks, both sides can declare victory of a sort. That is not a good outcome for Israel. The situation is much more complicated and ominous than in many decades.
Israel smoked out and degraded, for now, significant new Hamas capabilities to attack Israel. In assembling the target intelligence, Israel confirmed details about the volume, periodicity and nature of Iranian support to Hamas. It also learned Hamas' reaction time for retaliating with long range rockets plus the range and accuracy of those rockets.
It also learned that the rocket capabilities improvements would not be possible without Egyptian complicity, if not outright cooperation. This bodes ill because longer range and more accurate rockets and even short range ballistic missiles are almost certain to show up in the future inventory of Hamas. With help from Iranian Revolutionary Guards Qods Force operatives, Hamas rocketeers will get better. They are already better than they were in 2008.
Something else the Israelis learned, or more likely, confirmed, is that as far as President Obama is concerned they are on their own should they attempt to take out Iranian nuclear capabilities. The Americans have reduced their aircraft carrier strength in the Gulf to just a single task force instead of the three that would be needed to support an Israeli strike on Iran.
As for the US, the Israeli tail wagged the US dog and the US responded with political backing and promises of more military aid. The US also announced that only a single US aircraft carrier task group would be on station in the Persian Gulf region through the winter because of "mechanical problems" on the USS Nimitz.
Most Readers will know that US combat operations in the Middle East usually require three aircraft carrier task groups. The presence of a single carrier task group is peacetime combat readiness.
This means that the price of US support for Israel's counter-attack on Iran's proxy in Gaza this November is that Israel is on its own should it decide to attack Iran before next spring and beyond. The single carrier is a signal to Israel that the US does not intend to help militarily. [My emphasis]
Israel succeeded in degrading Hamas' immediate capability for firing rockets into Israel. Israel achieved nothing permanent, however, as long as Iran remains a reliable arms provider for Hamas. ALL that Israel can do is knock down Hamas and Israel has to keep at it regularly.
The other key player in this wretched game is Egypt. Its leader has “strutted his hour upon the stage” posing as a ‘peace-keeper’ but he is situated uneasily between two contrary forces. His Muslim Brotherhood supporters are urging him to support Hamas whilst his army, dependent as they are on American military aid, advise him to stay as neutral as possible. His people, meanwhile, want bread not guns and as they have shown already they are capable of making their feelings known in dramatic ways. NightWatch summarise the whole situation thus:
Hamas and Iran learned the limits of Israeli power, confirmed Israel's reluctance to take casualties [by not invading with ground troops], learned details about the saturation point for Iron Dome, and learned about Israeli retaliation capabilities.
This eight-day war is, thus, a turning point because Hamas, like Hezbollah in Lebanon, has proven it can strike at the heart of Israel and still live to tell the tale. This is a breakthrough tactical development. From now on, Israel is on the defensive and the threat will get worse unless a secular revolution occurs in Iran.
Egypt is at a crossroads between cooperating with the US to receive essential US military and economic assistance and following the core beliefs of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Egyptian government of President Mursi will try to do both.
Egypt has no capability to stop arms smuggling into Gaza. It has no ability to guarantee a Palestinian ceasefire. Hamas itself has no ability to guarantee a ceasefire. It does not speak for Islamic Jihad or a score of other, smaller fighting groups.
The ceasefire will be violated, but for now the signatories to the agreement will insist the ceasefire is intact … until supplies are replenished. [My emphasis]
So, there you have it, several reasons not to be cheerful, er, have a nice day!
